After decades of low growth, Thunder Bay has been
experiencing a period of growth that affords it an opportunity to reshape its
urban landscape. Historically, Thunder
Bay has allowed its urban footprint to expand in a low-density highly dispersed web
that is more costly to service and provide efficient infrastructure such
as water and sewer as well as public transit.
The recent spate of population growth as well as the availability of provincial
and federal money for housing means that Thunder Bay could be making some major
strides building density in its core urban areas. This of course would complement the rather
large dollar amounts that have recently been expended for urban redevelopment
projects in the downtown cores such as the North
Core Streetscape Project and the Victoria
Avenue Revitalization.
Alas, in its haste to meet federal and provincial housing
targets and obtain government money, Thunder Bay is on the verge of yet again
squandering the opportunities that have presented themselves by engaging in
short term decision making that will build scattered density developments that
will sprout like toadstools after a summer’s rain. City officials have noted
that they are only 32 percent of the way in meeting their housing targets and must
build an additional 1200 units by February 2027 to meet the target of 1,755
housing units. The proposed locations for density development are at 300
Tokio Street, 144 Fanshaw Street, 791 Arundel Street, 211-223 Tupper Street and
224 Camelot Street.
Of these four proposed locations, three are essentially going
to be plonked on available space – often green space – in the midst or
immediately adjacent to existing residential areas. Only one – the Camelot Street location is
going to be placed near a downtown core area.
And that is the point. To date,
the large builds on Junot and Fulton have been built in or adjacent to existing
lower density residential areas and often at the expense of nearby green
space. Except for Camelot – which is a
good location if one is planning to build up core area density – these are all
scattered willy-nilly in places where the only option is to drive somewhere to
get anything done.
Thunder Bay needs to use this opportunity for growth to be
more strategic in how it does its housing if it wants to truly build
density. The density housing projects in
this city should be designed to concentrate population near services and
amenities, not encourage more time-consuming commuting in the long run, to meet
short term funding targets. The density build locations in Thunder Bay should be the
two former downtown cores areas of Port Arthur and Fort William and the
corridor connecting them that runs along and immediately adjacent to Water/Fort
William Road/Simpson Streets and Algoma/Memorial/May Streets. It is up to the mayor and council to provide
this type of directive to its administration because simply asking them to come
up with sites for density build will generate the quickest solution rather than
a methodical plan for infill.
What might such a density corridor look like? A good example is rooted in the urban renewal
studies of the past. Plate 20 of the 1968
Proctor and Redfern Downtown Fort William Urban Renewal envisioned a Simpson
Street with density rental housing as the accompanying figure illustrates. Many
of those apartments or condos would likely have sweeping views of the lake and
provide for a mix of both premium and affordable units with room for shops, stores and offices on
the street level. Indeed, the recent
redevelopment of Simpson Street's road and sewer infrastructure should have
presented an opportunity for the consolidation of derelict and underused
properties to build the multi-unit buildings the city seems to so desperate o ram through existing residential neighbourhoods and green space.
This opportunity is going to be short-lived and if we simply
build things in an erratic short term pattern, we will have to live with the
costs for decades to come. Our municipal politicians need to actually step up and lead for a change by providing direction rather than hide behind bureaucratic processes. This window of opportunity will not last long.
